When Johannesburg native Charl de Beer moved back to South Africa, he started a company aiming to rent out freshly laundered linens to the 18,000 Airbnb hosts in Cape Town.

But then Cape Town experienced a water shortage crisis that threatened his business - his water costs quadrupled in a year.

"If you're a business, that's catastrophic," he says.

Fortunately for him he came across a new technology - polymer beads to replace water - that could apparently reduce the amount of water laundry uses by up to 80%.

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